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" I had no concerns - I had no reason to have concerns based on what was available to me about North's contacts with the private sector people, but I didn't think a CIA person should do it. "
Robert M. Gates
CIA
People
Person
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" I have tried to maintain civil relationships with everyone I meet - and, even if I violently disagree with them, try to be respectful. "
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" Things have gotten so nasty in Washington. "
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" I have always that there ought to be some kind of mandatory national service, not necessarily in the military but to show everybody that freedom isn't free, that everybody has an obligation to the nation as a community. "
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" One of my favorite little sayings is, 'To avoid criticism, say nothing, do nothing, be nothing.' "
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" I will always be an advocate in terms of wars of necessity. I am just much more cautious on wars of choice. "
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" I think that Iran with a nuclear weapon is extremely destabilizing. I think it could precipitate a nuclear arms race in the region. "
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" I've seen, all too often in my career, people coming in to lead agencies and organizations and trying to impose change from the top down. Never works. You never have enough time. "
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" Health care costs are eating the Defense Department alive. "
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" I consider myself a Republican. "
Robert M. Gates
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" I read in the press, and therefore it must be true, that no secretary of defense had ever been quoted as arguing for a bigger budget for State. "
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" If there's ever an example that military power alone cannot be successful in Afghanistan, I think it was the Soviet experience. "
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" Well, Israel, obviously, thinks of the Iranian nuclear program as an existential threat to Israel. "
Robert M. Gates
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" I had no difficulty as Secretary of Defense moving from the Bush administration to the Obama administration. "
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" There is no international problem that can be addressed or solved without the engagement and leadership of the United States and everybody in the world knows that, its just fact of life. So sometimes I think we could conduct ourselves with a little more humility. "
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" Well, I've ruffled a few feathers at all the institutions I've led. But I think that's part of leadership. "
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" The United States has been a global power since late in the 19th century. "
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" No president is well-served by groupthink or by everybody singing from the same sheet of music they think he's on. "
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" I've spent my entire adult life with the United States as a superpower and one that had no compunction about spending what it took to sustain that position. And it didn't have to look over its shoulder because our economy was so strong. "
Robert M. Gates
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" I have always voted for who I believed was the best person. "
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" The reality is, the United States has global interests. Our defense budget is about the same as the defense budgets or military budgets of every other country in the world put together. "
Robert M. Gates
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" I wish I could set deadlines for the Congress, but that's just not the way the Constitution is written. "
Robert M. Gates
Constitution
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" If Poindexter made a comment to me like that, it would have been in the context of once the authorized program is approved there would be no point in having any of these private benefactors any longer. "
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" A wild and crazy weekend involves sitting on the front porch, smoking a cigar, reading a book. "
Robert M. Gates
Smoking
Book
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" I'm a big advocate of drones. "
Robert M. Gates
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" There's a lot of books out there about how you lead change in business, but I've certainly not seen any... on how you do that in public institutions. "
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" Even when I was at CIA, I'd go to visit foreign leaders and I'd say, 'You know, I'm not a diplomat. I'm just an old CIA guy'... I said, 'If I wanted to be diplomatic, I'd have been a diplomat.' "
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" Most governments lie to each other. That's the way business gets done. "
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" You know, if I were an - if I were a Taliban, I'd say, 'What did al-Qaida ever do for me except get me kicked out of Afghanistan?' "
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" Well, what I've said is that the war in Iraq will always be clouded by how it began, which was a wrong premise, that there were in fact no weapons of nuclear - weapons of mass destruction. "
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" I don't think any president that I worked with has ever said 'pretty please.' "
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